COMMON QUESTION

Mold has chased the Ewings from their Loris home.

Everything inside is essentially ruined, covered with toxic mold spores distributed through the air conditioning system.

Caroline Ewing cried for months. "You feel like you've lost your home and your history - we have lost our history," she said.

South Carolina's humidity creates mold-related problems for homeowners - problems that can't be measured by existing governmental health guidelines and generally aren't covered by insurance. Mold even forced Gov. Mark Sanford and his family to bail out of the Governor's Mansion while crews undertake a remediation project that could exceed $1 million.

"The Governor's Mansion has brought it back to the forefront," said Tom McHood of A&I Fire and Water Restoration.

Whether mold problems are actually becoming more widespread is unclear.

Experts have different theories.

Part of the reason mold has become more of an issue could be the way buildings are constructed, said Richard Bennett, a certified industrial hygienist and chief science officer with Risk Tech LLC, an environmental-health services company in South Carolina that is cleaning up the Governor's Mansion.

"After the energy crisis in the 1970s, we sealed our buildings up," he said. That's a good thing from an energy-conservation standpoint, but "when water goes into a building now, it can't get back out and it doesn't dry quickly," he said.

Fred Newby, a Myrtle Beach attorney who specializes in construction cases, said, "I don't know if this is a new problem or our testing methods have gotten more sophisticated."

Either way, fixing the problem is expensive.

A full cleanup of even a modest residential home could run $50,000 to $100,000 or more, Bennett said.

That's what the Ewings are facing.

Back in July 2003, Caroline Ewing had trouble sleeping, experienced itchy eyes and had other symptoms.

An out-of-state mold inspector found toxic varieties of mold in their home. The spores had been distributed through the air conditioning system, and covered everything, including heirlooms and kitchen pots.

Mold-contaminated items must be cleaned before they are moved into a new or decontaminated living space, but the cost to decontaminate it can exceed the value of the property itself, and homeowners insurance policies don't cover most mold problems. Insurance companies see most mold-related problems as maintenance issues rather than acts of God.

The Ewings haven't made a final decision on what they'll keep and clean. Meanwhile, they're living in a second house, making two house payments, two utility payments and digging into their savings, Caroline Ewing said.

Spores and symptoms

Research on mold's health impact is ongoing, and there are no federal or state guidelines for the amount of mold spores acceptable in residential air.

Industrial hygienists usually do the evaluation of the number of mold spores inside a home or office. They typically compare the species of mold inside to what naturally occurs outside the building.

Certain creatures, including stachybotris and penicillium, are more likely to cause health problems, but the effect of a mold problem on someone's health isn't predictable based strictly on the number of spores in the air.

"It really affects some people more than others," said Steve Kahn of Full Steam Ahead Fire and Water Restoration.

If a test finds a high level of toxic spores in a home, the hygienists or remediation experts might recommend the homeowner leave the house.

Dianne Minasium, program coordinator in the S.C. Health Department's Bureau of Air Quality, said that, because there are no governmental guidelines, DHEC doesn't do inspections or testing.

The best DHEC can do is point people to the Environmental Protection Agency's information, available at EPA.gov/mold. DHEC will mail the same information in brochure form to people who do not have Internet access.

The EPA encourages homeowners to clean a mold area of less than 10 square feet in size. Harder surfaces can be cleaned with detergent and water, but must be dried thoroughly. More permeable surfaces might have to be removed altogether.

But if the moldy area is larger, the EPA recommends a professional cleanup service.

The problem for homeowners is that standard homeowner insurance policies don't cover mold remediation, although Full Steam Ahead's Kahn said so-called HO6 condominium policies typically will cover mold.

Some insurance companies are offering mold riders that can be added to existing single-family home policies for an extra fee, but the payouts are capped, usually less than $10,000.

In South Carolina, Nationwide's homeowner policy includes up to $5,000 coverage for mold remediation, but only if the mold developed as a result of a type of water damage that already is covered in the policy, said spokesman Kevin Craiglow.

Jane Swanson, who lives in the River Hillls subdivision of Little River, takes Tylenol Sinus while she waits for her house to be fixed.

"I sort of have problems with drainage and allergies, and my husband noticed this musty smell," said Jane Swanson, who lives in the River Hills subdivision of Little River.

The Swansons had Clean Space of the Carolinas inspect their crawl space, where the company discovered a mold and mildew problem and presented the evidence in digital photos.

The couple accepted an offer from the company to clean up the area and line it with a heavy-duty, waterproof liner to prevent future problems. Clean Space says it's easy for the mold spores under the house to be drawn in the house.

The cleanup, encapsulation and dehumidifying process will cost more than $5,000.

"I can't wait to get it done because it's going to take care of all this," she said.

How mold gets in

Local mold remediation companies say mold problems are particularly common in second homes that are unoccupied for extended periods.

Usually it's water damage left unattended that allows mold to grow, said Kahn of Full Steam Ahead Fire and Water Restoration.

Culprits include incorrect flashing around windows, bad drainage on air conditioning units and overflowing drain pans on refrigerators.

Cleaning, paying, reselling

Professional remediation is essential for many reasons, said McHood of A&I Fire and Water Restoration.

"It creates a liability issue if you sell the house, and the mold comes back," McHood said.

South Carolina and most other states require the seller of a home to disclose "all material facts," and that includes mold problems, said Tom Maeser, president of Fortune Academy, a local real estate school.

The N.C. Association of Realtors includes on its Web site guidelines from the National Association of Realtors, which say in part that sellers should disclose "mold-related conditions, water intrusion and presence of known existing or past mold [other than that which is known not to adversely affect the property or its occupants]."

Keeping moisture out

The key to prevention is controlling humidity and moisture in the home, but techniques will differ between the crawl space and the rest of the house, local experts said.

"They automatically think of mold as plumbing leaks," said Sandy Poe of Red Flag Home Inspections. "In our area, the big problem is people having their homes shut tight."

Poe recommends running the kitchen and bathroom fans, especially when owners are away for extended periods of time.

Crawl spaces need almost the opposite of the living space, said John Fisher of Clean Space of the Carolinas.

Building codes have required crawl space ventilation, but Fisher said recent research shows ventilation is creating problems.

Humid air, entering crawl space vents, doesn't just flow through, Fisher said.

The degree of problems resulting from mold vary, and in the case of the Ewings in Loris, the toll it has been more than financial. It's more like a broadside against their entire lives.

"We've been married 35 years, and this is the hardest thing we've been through," Caroline Ewing said.

"I guess we're in good company if the governor has it, too," Alton Ewing said.

Knight Ridder contributed to this report.Contact COLIN BURCH at cburch@thesunnews.com or 626-0305.